English Language Foundation

This unit focuses on your ability to understand and use the English language accurately when you read, speak, listen and write. We will concentrate on the English you need for undergraduate level study in your chosen subject area, covering grammar, subject area vocabulary and the four language skills of reading, writing, listening and speaking.

A key element of the unit is the grammar of the language, and particularly the verb tense system in English, because your ability to use the verb tense system accurately will be extremely important when you come to write essays and reports. This unit will focus in particular on the grammar of the language.

We will also focus on reading, listening and speaking skills in the context of your chosen subject area. Beginning with short texts, we will practise each skill and practise it again, so that gradually you will see, hear and feel that your command of the language is improving. 

A recurring focus of the unit will be your acquisition of 'learner autonomy'. This means your ability to acquire the language yourself, without needing a teacher's help. This is important because from next year you will not have an English teacher to help you. So we will consider and practise strategies to help you gain confidence in your own ability to increase your knowledge of and ability to use the language, including for instance guessing meaning of difficult words, deciding which words are important in a text, recognising differences between formal and informal language, and other strategies, so that as the first semester continues, you begin to feel more confident in your use and experience with the English Language.

Academic Skills Foundation

When you begin your undergraduate level studies, you will be expected to have knowledge of and ability to use a large range of 'study skills'. You will also be expected to have some knowledge of the subject area you will  be studying. This unit deals with both of these aspects of your preparation for undergraduate level study. 

All of the academic skills are practised in English, so you will use your developing acquisition of the language from the partner unit 'English Language Foundation' to practise and gain mastery of these skills. You will also use your language and study skills as you learn the foundation of your subject area, putting the skills into practice as you learn.

Developing English Language Skills

This unit builds on the progress you made during its partner semester 1 unit 'English Language Foundation' and increasing your level from that which you had achieved by the end of semester 1. 

We will recycle the tense system in English and other elements of the grammar system, but you will  now learn how to use other aspects of the grammar, including the passive voice, as well as linking words and phrases and devices which enable you to write longer sentences but retain grammatical accuracy. 

You will notice that we gradually introduce more specialist language that you need in preparation for your degree and we will expect you to use and develop the skills that you gained in the previous units so that you are able to work more independently.

Academic Skills Development

This unit builds on the skills learnt and practised in its partner semester 1 unit 'Foundation Academic Skills'. We will add more skills to the list, including summarizing and synthesising, argumentation, critical thinking and referencing and citation skills, as well as several others and practise and test them in the same way as with the semester 1 unit.

We will also investigate the research skill and you will learn how to prepare a research proposal and conduct a literature review, and how to plan a research project, learning about the research tools available and how they can be used to conduct research in your chosen field. 

You will continue to broaden your knowledge of key current issues and theory in your chosen subject area, and apply the critical thinking and argumentation skills you acquire in this unit to argue for and against propositions you have studied in the form of in both essays and presentations and in seminar situations, ensuring that you are ready to step up to your chosen undergraduate course with a base level of subject area knowledge from which to continue your academic development as you progress to level 4 study.

Applied Numeracy For Business

This unit is part of a core spine of units that all Business students will encounter as part of their learning journey. This journey takes you through the begin stage at Level 4, to the thrive stage at level 5, to succeed stage at level 6.  
This unit is designed to support your Begin stage at level 4, it develops the numeracy skills and abilities you need to succeed in your studies and in the business world. The unit is designed to support you and develop your confidence in essential mathematics and statistics techniques, it applies these techniques in business context to give you an understanding of how they are used to solve problems and make decision in business organisations.

The connected core spine of units also enables you to network with peers from across the faculty just as you will be expected to work with colleagues throughout the organisation in the world of business.¿¿¿ 

The unit aims to achieve 

• provide students with the fundamental knowledge and understanding of numeracy in business.   
• develop student confidence in a range of numerical and statistical techniques.
• enable students apply a range of numerical and statistical techniques to practical business problems.   

Beginning Your Professional Business Journey

This unit is part of a core spine of units that all Business students will encounter as part of their learning journey. This journey takes you from the Begin stage at Level 4, to the Thrive stage at Level 5 through to the Succeed stage at Level 6. This unit is designed to support the Begin/Thrive/Succeed stage by introducing you to the skills that you will require in order to develop your professional practice.

The connected core spine of units also enables you to network with peers from across the faculty just as you will be expected to work with colleagues throughout the organisation in the world of business.  

This unit will help you to begin your journey in Business and provide you with the support you will need to develop your professional practice.

In this unit you will be presented with Business challenges which will allow you to collaborate with peers, and provide an insight in to a professional Business environment. 

Sustainable Business In Tourism And Hospitality

This unit aims to achieve: 

• To provide a basis for more detailed study of major component sectors of the industry 
• To develop an appreciation of the main characteristics of the international tourism and hospitality industry 
• To facilitate insights into current problems and business developments in the main sectors of the tourism and hospitality industry, particularly in relation to sustainability 
• To investigate the impacts of tourism and hospitality operations, and how these can be managed sustainably. 
• To become familiar with relevant research sources within both the tourism and hospitality industry and academia. 

Managing People In Tourism And Aviation

This unit aims to help future managers create an inspiring and rewarding workplace where talented people can work to the best of their ability to meet internal and external customers’ needs and our wider social responsibility.  

• This unit aims to achieve: 
  • For learners to gain knowledge of the importance of leading, managing and working in a team; 
  • Appreciate the different styles of leadership and management; 
  • Apply people managing skill in the labour-intensive commercial the tourism and aviation industry. 

Career In Practice

Aims and Relevance

This unit uses active learning to give you the opportunity to put your learning so far into the context of your chosen area of practice. You will use the project of your choice to assess your readiness to work in your chosen area as well as your understanding of the project planning process.

With insights from local employers and industry professionals, you will gain real insight into likely challenges in your chosen project, along with your current employability skills, knowledge and state of readiness to work. Through the reflective process, you will consider your career readiness and development needs for your future career.

This unit aims to:

• Build and apply your employability skills by providing a solution for a relevant project.
• Support your active learning experience through self-reflection, considering your career readiness and development needs

Travel And Tourism Law

Travel and Tourism law is a highly specialist subject and is an expanding area of law in the commercial world. From dealing with insolvencies of tour operators or airlines, to the role of ABTA and their code of conducts; the relevance and reach of travel and tourism law is increasingly significant. There are numerous obligations and civil rights that arise from the package holiday contract and other travel and tourism related arrangements. It is therefore vital that the travel and tourism specialist develops sound knowledge in this area; to be able to pre-empt and if not react to fast paced changes in such a dynamic industry.

The unit is designed to enable you to confidently handle, analyse, synthesise and apply the operation of legal principles within Travel and Tourism law. It will focus on standard form, terms and conditions, rules on exclusion clauses and disclaimers of liability, misrepresentation in contract and negligent misstatement in tort law.  The legal status and liability of the tour operator and travel agent will also be examined; questioning whether the travel agent can be both agents of the client and of the tour operator in the context of the tripartite agency relationship.

The unit has also been developed to incorporate aviation law; for example the impact of the Montreal Convention on Air Carrier Liability.  No study of Travel law would be complete without a consideration of EC261/2004; the Denied Boarding Regulations.  The unit implements research informed teaching to exemplify these highly topical issues; not just of importance to travel and tourism professionals, but anyone who enjoys international and national air travel.

Intercultural Management In Tourism

Relevance: In this unit you will explore the application of intercultural communication theories in an international tourism business environment. Emphasis is placed on developing intercultural interactive competence and introducing key aspects of managing behaviour and expectations across cultures. You will explore working relationships and different communication preferences with people from different cultural backgrounds, preparing you to work in an increasingly global environment. You are required to apply concepts and develop skills through experiential learning gained through class activities, case studies, and group interaction.

The aims of this unit are to:

• To conceptualize intercultural interaction and produce frameworks for comparing cultures in international tourism business and develop rapport management competencies in business interactions
• To undertake a detailed investigation of the changing face of management across cultures

Cultural Tourism And Heritage Management

All travel involves a cultural element. This unit provides a critical insight into the complexity of cultural tourism and its increasing globalisation in existing as well as emergent destinations around the world. Alongside the rise of cultural tourism, heritage management has become a significant component of the global tourism industry. Heritage Management has profound power and influence upon the preservation, conservation, presentation and representation of culture and heritage within tourism.

Within this unit, you will develop an understanding of how the concept of heritage continues to evolve in relation to ever-shifting political, economic, political and socio-cultural landscapes. The unit also provides an overview, exploration and analysis of a range of issues based on current research in cultural tourism and heritage management. This will include the fragmentation of cultural tourism, demand for cultural tourism, cultural tourism as a double edged sword – balancing increased visitation and overuse against the survival and protection of these sites / attractions / destinations and issues in sustainable cultural and heritage tourism.

Events And Destination Marketing

The unit aims to provide you with a coherent examination of the fundamental principles, concepts, policies and analytical frameworks of destination marketing. The unit introduces the principles of marketing and marketing research before applying these to tourism destinations. The purpose of the unit is to also focus on the key issues and trends that influence destination marketing and place branding, including the use of events. You will develop the necessary knowledge, understanding and skills necessary for the development of successful destination marketing strategies.

The success or failure of tourism destinations in the international market depends to a great extent on the tourism industry’s ability to employ effective marketing strategies and create meaningful destination images. This unit considers some of the major issues relating to international tourism marketing and the contribution of an integrated marketing strategy to gaining a competitive advantage. The focus is placed upon the exploration of key concepts related to destination marketing to build an understanding of the challenges facing contemporary destinations.

Tourism And Society

Within this unit, a multidisciplinary approach is used to explore the relationship between tourism and the social sciences, with a particular focus on the burgeoning link between tourism and sociology. Sociology continues to be a central discipline from which tourism has borrowed many of its theoretical and conceptual perspectives.

The tourist, the host and shifting communities set the background for an exploration of a range of critical topics areas. Considerable social and cultural transformations have been produced through tourism and touristic behaviours; from the process of urbanisation and the transformation of the city, developments in the use of leisure time and the function of travel and ordering of social life according to the many dimensions of culture, consumption and consumerism.

The student will be taken on a journey which straddles several disciplines allowing them to travel many roads within this unit. Topics will include ‘The Gaze’ (host and tourist), globalisation and liquid modernity, development, mobilities and feminist tourism to name a few. The unit draws on many international examples, case studies and approaches issues at the local, national and global scale.

Continuing Professional Development

Excellent high performing managers exhibit self-awareness and engage in decision making with an understanding of their own and others’ capabilities. These abilities enable visionary approaches to problem solving and effective development of others.

This unit provides an opportunity for you to reflect upon your own individual competence areas and to further develop these through self-assessment techniques and comparisons with a variety of models of continuing professional development. You will develop critical evaluation and reflective observation skills in the context of personal effectiveness which will facilitate critique across a range of issues in business environments.

Through reflection on your performance during your experiential learning activities, psychometric tests and exercises, this unit gives you the opportunity to better understand your personal performance, get insight into working across cultures, manage yourself effectively, become a more reflective learner, develop effective career plans and begin the process of continuous professional development.
 

Aims: The aims of this unit is to :

• To critically evaluate personal models of effectiveness in management contexts
• To identify, reflect upon and evidence key areas for your personal development
• To facilitate a commitment to continuous professional development, underpinned by an evidence-based rationale
• To develop positive and enquiring approaches and to challenge existing preconceptions so as to integrate new knowledge for application.
• To develop Mindfulness, allowing you to make informed decisions
• To contribute to your development as a well-informed and skilled manager who will compete effectively in the workplace.

Tourism Destination Development

This unit aims to critically evaluate international tourism destination development from a number of theoretical perspectives.  The purpose is to provide you with an understanding of the nature of tourism destinations by exploring the underlying factors leading to the development of places (urban, coastal and rural) as tourist destinations and also examine the exploitation of different destination environments as a tourism resource.  You will gain a comprehensive understanding of international tourist destinations and given the opportunity to acquire and develop a range of critical thinking and analytical techniques by reviewing destination development plans.  

Destination development issues are central to managing global tourism in a complex and changing world.  This unit is of relevance to you as future tourism (destination) managers because you need to be aware of how places, for tourism consumption, are developed to achieve competitive results.  Therefore, also recognising the role Destination Management Organisations (DMOs) play in advocating development of places, people and populations.  You will be presented with the opportunity to critically inspect the costs, benefits and implications associated with developing tourist destinations in different international contexts.

Critical Issues In Tourism And Hospitality

The unit aims to introduce you to the critical issues confronting tourism and hospitality management in a global context. The purpose of this unit is to advance your critical management knowledge and skills for tourism and hospitality, therefore developing a ‘philosophic practitioner’[1]. This unit intends to instil a transdisciplinary awareness of the critical issues, which are central to practice in tourism and hospitality. The unit will be heavily informed by current research in critical issues, from within tourism and hospitality management. The unit expects you to acknowledge the behaviours and experiences of those involved in the tourism and hospitality industry as hosts and guests from a ‘non-business’ standpoint.

This critically-focused unit is of relevance to your future managerial roles in industries which affect people, populations and places in a negative and positive way. Thus, ensuring that you are sensitive and aware of the critical alliances between international tourism and hospitality and the societies which they come into contact with. It is important that you are aware of both the ‘non-business’ and ‘business’ sides of the tourism and hospitality industry and research to inform your decision-making as a philosophic practitioner – in ever-changing tourism and hospitality world.

Research Methods

The unit aims to explain and analyse the practices in tourism, hospitality, events and aviation research. The unit focusses on designing, collecting, analysing, reporting and interpreting data using qualitative and quantitative methods. In developing your research skills, this unit enables you to design a research proposal which provides the foundations and underpinnings for your final dissertation project. Central to this unit is the University of Bedfordshire’s research-informed-teaching (RiT) and research-informed-learning (RiL) strategy, which ensures you are kept up-to-date with research and research skills in tourism, hospitality, events and aviation.

The ability to conduct research and to interpret information is a key skill in both the academic and commercial worlds. Gaining an understanding of research and of the research process, and experiencing it, is important for a number of reasons. Firstly knowledge, and consequently understanding, is based upon research; secondly research is playing an increasingly acknowledged role in the planning and management of tourism, hospitality and events. Nearly all jobs within these sectors will use research skills. Finally, this unit introduces you to both theory and practice of research and prepares you for further study.

Research Project

The unit aims to synthesise various overall course elements in preparation for the pursuit of one area of interest through independent research and study. The purpose of the unit is to further develop your skills in performing research in tourism, hospitality, events and aviation.  You will be required to design and present a coherent academic project on your selected topic, informed by previous research, in the form of a dissertation; demonstrating your abilities to analyse, critique and interpret a research problem / question / statement specific to tourism, hospitality, events or aviation.

The dissertation is an integral part of the Honours degree; you cannot be awarded an Honours degree without successful completion of the dissertation. You will conduct independent research in an area of academic, personal, and / or professional interest to you.  Your chosen area of research should be very closely aligned to your degree programme. The dissertation presents you with an opportunity to contribute to current knowledge and express your understanding and skills in your specialist field of tourism, hospitality, events or aviation

Tourism And Sustainable Development

The unit seeks to provide you with the skills to develop a broad range of insight into the various dimensions of development and the role of the tourism sector in facilitating it.

The unit is designed to unpack the core concepts of tourism discourse within current research and to deconstruct key models of development theory in relation to current trends and future advancement within the sector.

The unit seeks to provide critical theoretical and practical understanding of impacts of tourism development based on 21^st century issues and challenges.

To hypothesise on the significance of social, economic and cultural framework conditions for the use of tourism as a sustainable development tool.

Professional Practice Year (Tourism, Events And Aviation)

The aim of this unit is to provide the opportunity to undertake career-related experience which will allow you to understand and undertake responsibilities in the work place at an appropriate level and use the opportunity to assess your readiness to undertake a career in your chosen field

Strategic Business Planning

In any given business change is a constant. Change brings both risks and opportunities for a business. The unit is designed to help you develop knowledge and understanding of how the productivity and growth of a business are affected by the dynamic environment within which it operates. The unit aims to help you: 

1.       Explore factors that drive change and understand how strategic planning can help maximise opportunities for growth both locally and globally 

2.       Review decision-making processes and explore how businesses can be committed to implementing sustainable and responsible business practices

3.       Become aware of key elements and principles of financial management and understand the value of data analytics and key metrics to monitor growth and support strategic decision making

Review how technologies can be adapted to improve operational efficiency and drive competitive advantage 

Employment Law

This unit is designed to provide students with an opportunity for the advanced study of the law governing the employment relationship and the regulation of working life.
In addition to gaining a detailed knowledge of the principles and norms of employment law, throughout the unit students will be encouraged to develop an understanding of the political, economic and social issues that have shaped the development of this area of law.

The influence of European law will be considered throughout the unit, which will also discuss and develop broader theoretical issues, such as the balance between regulating the employment relationship and leaving discretion to the contracting parties to exercise their own judgements in specific cases.

Data And Research Methods For Business

This unit is part of a core spine of units that all Business students will encounter as part of their learning journey. This journey takes you to the Thrive stage at Level 5 and the unit is designed to support the Begin/Thrive/Succeed stage by building on the academic study skills and numeracy skills acquired during your first year and introduces you to both theory and practice of research and prepares you for the final year Research Project. 
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The connected core spine of units also enables you to network with peers from across the faculty just as you will be expected to work with colleagues throughout the organisation in the world of business.¿¿ 
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The ability to conduct research and to interpret information is a key skill in both the academic and commercial worlds. Effective managerial decision-making is heavily dependent on high-quality data and information in a variety of forms and from a variety of sources.  Gaining an understanding of research and of the research process, and experiencing it as part of a research community will provide valuable transferrable skills for a career in business or further study.  
 
This unit aims to achieve: 
an understanding and appreciation of the central role of data in business. 
an ability to evaluate information sources appropriately to support arguments and to inform decision-making at all levels. 
an appreciation of the benefits and limitations of common research approaches and quantitative and qualitative research methods. 
an understanding of common qualitative and quantitative research techniques including sampling and data collection approaches as well as data analysis. 

Contingency Planning And Crisis Management

• This unit aims to achieve: 
  • to create awareness of the importance of comprehensive contingency planning 
  • to assess consequences of planning deficiencies or failure to exercise due diligence 
  • to evaluate how to respond to crises and manage risk 

Marketing And Digital Transformation In Travel And Tourism

• The aim of this unit is: 
  • to provide students with the academic knowledge and professional skills to study marketing in the travel and tourism context. The emphasis is on a strategic approach to marketing in digitally advanced market environment and a global perspective is adopted.  
  • To provide students with the basic marketing concepts (Including STP and the 4Ps of marketing) needed to understand the role of marketing in the travel and tourism industries.  
  • To develop an understanding of the key principles of marketing, impact of macro-environment, strategic analysis of opportunities and threats for marketing purposes, and design and implement marketing plan. 

Managing The Experience Economy

This unit aims to achieve:

1.       An understanding of the different types of economic values

2.       Explain the benefits of the experience economy

3.       Understand the benefits of staging an experience

4.       How to create an experience

An awareness of the principles in the design stage.